Documented on a bystander s cell phone,
a Uygur man lies in a street in Urumqi,
shot by security forces a er charging
them with what appeared to be a sword.
JULY 13, 2009
THE FIRST SEVERAL SECONDS of the incident in Urumqi seemed almost
lighthearted, considering the previous week. And they revealed
nothing about what would follow. A cool front had swept over
the city on this particular day in July, drawing people from their
homes. Some shops stayed closed because their windows had
been shattered, but food vendors pushed their carts out onto the
street. A week earlier an ethnic clash had broken out here, killing
almost 200 people in one of China s most deadly protests since
the Tiananmen Square massacre two decades ago. So the Chinese
government had sent tens of thousands of security forces into